Materie: Poesie. Zum Werk Gerhard Falkners ed. by Constantin Lieb, Hermann Korte and Peter Geist (review)

This collection of essays is a welcome reminder of Gerhard Falkner’s (*1951) literary accomplishments, which have received scant scholarly notice over the decades. Due to their esprit and intensity, his works have been aptly adumbrated as a “Poesie der physischen Präsenz” in a review by Hellmuth Opitz. To demonstrate his œuvre’s richness, the editors organized the discussion around genres. While priority is given to poetry (Michael Braun, Alexandru Bulucz, Jost Eickmeyer, Peter Geist, Malte Kleinjung, Hermann Korte, Jan Wilm), drama (Thomas Irmer), prose (Gregor Dotzauer), essays and polemical pieces (Maren Jäger, Steffen Popp), and translations (Robert Matthias Erdbeer) are covered as well. The amount of scrutiny varies greatly: the 12 essays range from a mere six pages to 35 pages.

In method, a number of essays are inspired by poststructuralists such as Paul de Man or Werner Hamacher, though current trends of the discipline are more palpable. Some essays are informed by authorship theories (Wilm), and concepts of the “poeta doctus” (Eickmeyer); others use Bourdieu-inspired models to explain Falkner’s self-positioning as maverick in the literary market (Korte). Rather than studying poetic features in terms of innovation, contributors foreground legacies or what Wilfried Barner would call “Traditionsverhalten.” This explains why technical terms such as “Fragment, Ruine, Ekphrasis” assume quasi-timeless properties and are not limited to modern dissonance (14). Postmodern inflections have also exerted major influence on the interpreters’ approach. If Materie: Poesie is supposed to alert us to poetry’s physical properties, its meaning extends to more elusive aspects. Leaving material concerns—such as a whimsical “Apologie des Buchstabens h” (95)— aside, readers will appreciate elucidations of cognitive complexity (“Wiederholung,” “Paradoxie,” “Polyphonie”) which find their transcendental counterpart in the sublime (“Besee-lung,” “Unfaßbares”). Falkner’s notion of “Unschärfe” (14) prompted several interpreters to augment his poetic uncertainty principle. They describe his poems metaphorically as “clouds” (Wilm, 79) or “Räume” (Buluscz, 90). This is where a “Poetik des Schwindels” (Kleinjung, 105) can unfold.

Materie: Poesie targets three issues. First, the writer’s idealism: as Braun points out, Falkner’s adherence to the “hohe Ton”—embodied by Rilke and Hölderlin (14)— shows a disdain for mainstream tendencies of the 1980s. Popp (162) and Eickmeyer (206) agree, though Korte cautions that evocations of the sublime (186) or the beautiful (208) are kept in check by the ironic realization of the precursors’ “erkaltete Größe” (152). Geist captures the cultural pessimism underlying the poet’s appreciation of the classics very well: antiquity provides the yardstick for launching a critique of humble moderns whose expressive abilities collapse when confronted with an altar’s unspeakable beauty. Geist equates this crisis of expression with an “Aufeinanderstoßen von antiker Schönheit und allgemeiner Geschichtsvergessenheit” (136). Second, there is widespread consensus on Falkner’s combative stance, culminating in his “Bekenntnis zur poetischen Militanz” (212). From Dotzauer’s or Popp’s perspective, it can materialize in provocative “Gesten der Überlegenheit” (57) or an ill-tempered “Abwertung” (168). Third, Falkner’s works cherish Enlightenment ideals such as “Geist” or “Gedanke” (30–32, 50). No shallow puns but witty allusions may tickle the reader’s imagination (34). The writer insists on absorbing scientific insights, lest the poems should lose their “Diskursfähigkeit” (157). Such compatibility with theoretical discourses ought not to diminish the power of poetic wording (148).

Among the genres, poetry takes center stage. Wilm philosophizes about the poems’ protean gestalt (78) and reads word-clouds as symbolic expressions of mortality (76). In like manner, Bulucz perceives poems as “Räume der Stille” (90) which are gradually filled with sound (93) when letters come alive; the poems’ deregulated spelling reveals unorthodox thinking (97). Beginning with a genealogy of the fragment (9–28), Jäger approaches Falkner’s own fragmentarism and notices a transition from a willful demolition of syntax (37) to the representation of the Pergamon altar as fragmented object (41). The “Faszinosum des Sch...